David Copperfield and the Pursuit of Happiness

Abstract

The man who is incapable of his own happiness. One who is always in pursuit of happiness. Result. Where is happiness to be found then. Surely not everywhere? Can that be so, after all? Is this my experience?" (entry 34). In these musing remarks, recorded in his 1855 notebook, Charles Dickens appears not to have been thinking about characters or motifs for his next project, but of "his own frenetic 'pursuit of happiness' and his frequent restlessness" (Kaplan 87). Middle-aged, increasingly disenchanted with his marriage, Dickens found himself almost obsessed, in the 1850s, with the idea of finding happiness—a fugitive emotion, an intangible condition that, in spite of his amazing success, still eluded him.

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